Jack White’s album No Name review: soul-soaring record from a rock master
By treating his sixth solo album as a gift to be shared for free, the White Stripes co-founder has stepped outside of the record industry paradigm with the freedom of a musician unchained.
One of the year’s best albums arrived last week with no fanfare, no price tag and no name.
The newest release by US musician Jack White – co-founder of the acclaimed and defunct Detroit duo The White Stripes – is composed of 13 hard-rocking, soul-soaring songs that underline his mastery of the rock ’n’ roll songwriting form.
In an era where record labels, large and small, struggle to capture listeners’ attention while attempting to market their artists’ latest work, White’s sixth solo album slipped into the world in a fashion best described as clandestine.
Last Friday, customers at Third Man Records in Detroit, Nashville and London received a free 12-inch vinyl record with their in-store and online purchases. It contained no song titles, no artwork and no liner notes. Its only identifying feature was the words “No Name” stamped in a blue font on an all-white sleeve.
Anyone who dropped the needle on the record was hit with a joyous surprise as White’s unmistakeable vocals and electric guitar attack burst from the speakers.
To date, though, White has not mentioned or promoted the album to his audience, which includes 1.7 million Facebook followers and 669,000 on Instagram.
As word spread, across White’s global fanbase and beyond, the record label responded by encouraging fans to bootleg the album – which has quickly become known as No Name – by sharing the songs online.
It’s not on Spotify, Apple or any other streaming service. For now, the only way to hear it is via YouTube uploads of people playing the record on their turntables, or the decidedly old-school method of downloading mp3 files ripped from vinyl.
It all adds up to a curious business decision that effectively surrenders the album to the free market, rather than attempt to recoup recording costs, which is what most labels tend to do.
But by treating No Name as a loss leader and a gift to be shared with no price tag attached, White has stepped outside of the traditional paradigm with the freedom of a musician unchained.
It helps that White, 49, is perhaps the world’s most independent popular artist, with access to much of the music industry’s machinery under his own roof.
He owns and operates Third Man, a combined record store and record label. Its Detroit headquarters sports a recording studio, mastering facility and vinyl pressing plant capable of producing 5000 records a day.
In recent years he has become a one-man army leading the charge for vinyl’s resurgence, while also challenging major labels to reinvest in the pressing plant hardware they once owned.
With his own music, he could not be more hands-on. For his two albums released in 2022 – an electric “Saturday night” LP titled Fear of the Dawn, followed by an acoustic “Sunday morning” set titled Entering Heaven Alive – he wrote all the songs, played all the instruments, recorded in his own studio and manufactured the vinyl in his own pressing plant.
“They’re all happening in my house,” he told The Australian in 2022. “I think I’m the only person doing that; maybe the first person to ever do all those components, from soup to nuts, as they say […] I’m not trying to brag about that; I’m just saying that it just shows that these things are important to me and how I do things.”
Given the lack of information surrounding No Name’s creation, it’s fair to assume the multi-instrumentalist once again tracked everything himself.
However, given his recent years of touring – including a one-off visit to Adelaide in late 2022 to headline the inaugural Harvest Rock festival – has seen him backed by a red-hot band in bassist Dominic Davis, drummer Daru Jones and keyboardist Quincy McCrary, perhaps those great players have joined him on his newest album, too.
For now it’s all a mystery, which is part of the attraction.
Yet none of this would be more than a footnote in music history if the songs on No Name didn’t impress. White’s set of blazing, innovative and riff-heavy rockers is some of the best music he’s issued in his 30-year career, and fans of his past work – from the urgent garage rock of The White Stripes, best known for its signature song Seven Nation Army, to his more varied and adventurous solo ventures – will find plenty to enjoy across its 42 minutes.
With hip-hop, pop and country music artists dominating the charts of late, some listeners lament a diminution of bone-shaking, headbanging, blues-inspired rock ‘n’ roll wherein the electric guitar is treated as a sacred totem of the utmost import.
In this respect, No Name is an undeniable statement of intent from one of modern rock’s greatest champions.
Postscript: Jack White's sixth album No Name received its official release on August 2, 2024, two weeks after the surprise vinyl giveaway.
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